Renee Carter Hall

I'm now officially one video behind, since they just posted one of Julia Child today, but if you missed the Bob Ross remix when it was first posted, here it is:



Not quite as good as the Mister Rogers one, but still fun. I admit the artist in me has always cringed at The Joy of Painting as far as artistic style/quality goes (I keep wanting to yell things like "Complementary colors! Gray it down! Atmospheric perspective!"), but as a creative personality, he had some things right, anyway.

Things have been busy lately, and updating the blog tends to get pushed to the bottom of the to-do list, but here are a few quick notes:

I've added another Anthro Dreams podcast to my website's audio page. "Sweet Nothings" is a bit of slice-of-life furry flash fiction originally written in response to the writing prompt "the ice cream shop." (While you're there, you can also check out the holiday-themed fantasy piece "An Older World," which I completely forgot to announce here when it first came out.)

Publication of By Sword and Star is moving along steadily; we're waiting for print proofs now, and the first chapters of the novel will also appear in the Anthro Dreams podcast as a teaser. Unless there are any unforeseeable snags, it looks like it'll be available next month. (I'm planning on taking pre-orders for signed copies starting soon; watch this space.)

The Odyssey online class I took this past month has wrapped up. It felt like it went by pretty fast, so it's kind of hard to evaluate how much I learned from it when I'm still absorbing some of the info. (I was, of course, reminded that I still hate critique, much as I recognize it as a necessary evil... but somehow I expect that's always going to be the case.) *shrug* At any rate, I can get focused now on coming up with a workable writing routine again and getting some momentum back that I lost over the last few months.

Finally, have a fun video. Bert knows what it's like to live with a writer... XD

It's been a very long week, and therefore I'm watching Muppet Show and Sesame Street clips on YouTube. XD

Always loved this song...



(Count yourselves lucky -- this week's Friday Find could have been Bert and Ernie with "Dance Myself to Sleep."

...

Oh, what the heck.)

Silly, catchy, all-around fun. I recommend playing it fairly loud. :)

http://www.furaffinity.net/view/4133907/

The artist's website can be found here. (I should probably note, though, that "The Happy Song" is pretty different from his usual work, which tends toward cinematic-feeling orchestral/new age instrumentals.)

Or at least, the writing and editing part. I sent the hopefully-mostly-final-except-for-minor-proofing version of By Sword and Star to the editor today. With other projects going on, I know the editor won't get to it for another month or so, but it felt good to finally cross it off the list, so to speak.

Oh, and I made a Wordle of the novel text:



I guess we know what the main character's name is, don't we? XD

My flash fiction title "Norma the Wal-Mart Greeter Meets the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse" is the co-winner of this year's Meager Puddle of Limelight Award for Best Short Story Title, hosted by jongibbs:

http://jongibbs.livejournal.com/186862.html

(Darn it, I knew I should have told my husband to go vote for me in the final round. Then it wouldn't have been a tie.) ;)

On a serious note, though, there is a certain satisfaction in knowing that I tied for first place without asking anybody outright to vote for me, even though it's possible I could have driven a few more voters to LJ to win outright. I'm just not crazy about doing the whole "hey guyz! go vote for me!!!" thing, even though I know it's not exactly frowned upon.

At any rate, both of us winners get a copy of Jon Gibbs' book Fur-Face (which I'd been wanting to read), a coffee mug that says "I are a writer" (sweet!), and either a guest blog post or an interview on his blog. Since I don't have any astounding ideas for blog posts at the moment, I'll be taking the interview option. Plus, interviews give me a satisfying illusion of importance. :)

(I really should make "Norma" into a series: "Norma the Wal-Mart Greeter Finds the Lost City of Atlantis," "Norma the Wal-Mart Greeter Meets Cthulhu"...)

Or not. :D

Sometimes the best writing advice shows up in unexpected places. In this case: Don't write something just because you think everybody will like it, or you'll wind up with a big mess that even you don't understand.

"Arthur Writes a Story"